Or are you ever too old? Bethan Cole hits 40, and refuses to go for the chop — even though the pressure is on to go short

The year 2011 is the year I hit 40. And I, like thousands of other women, have
started to wonder: “Am I too old to have long hair?” I don’t know why, but
it seems there’s an unwritten rule that, come 40 — and certainly 50 — women
have to cut their hair into a severe crop, like an extra from Prisoner Cell
Block H, or at least a neat little bob. I’m not sure whether it’s to do with
ageing and thinning hair, or the busy lifestyles and no time for the high
maintenance that long requires, but the pressure is on to go short.

Yet I don’t want to let go of my beautiful hair — it is halfway down my back
and gloriously thick. So I’m clinging on to images of women in the public
eye who have refused